Unhero
by QwayMelqnu
Summary: One would think that within a family of six, the feeling of loneliness would be a rare occurrence, but what if you were the outcast? What if everything you believed was different from that of almost everyone you knew? - BM/WW though they aren't central.


A/N: This is just a little one-shot that came to my head after reading jschneids "Son of the Bat" on my first day of discovering BMWW fiction. There's a lot of angst so if that ain't your thing, you might wanna move on. I rated it M for language and some mention of a mature subject. Hope some of you like it :)

P.S. - Feel free to point out any corrections. I didn't have an outside source beta it, so there's bound to be a few mistakes here and there.

* * *

THE UNHERO

"I hate this place!"

"Tom, please..."

"Let me go!" I hated how pathetic I sounded, but at that moment, I didn't really care. All I wanted to do was leave. My mother, on the other hand, had other ideas.

"I'll let you go, but only after you tell me what's wrong."

I turned in her grip, giving her an incredulous look. She probably didn't even realize how tightly she was holding me. I'd probably have a bruise on my arm in the morning.

"Are you serious?"

Years ago, I had held hope that my Dad would be the one person to understand me when situations like this arose, but with Dick and Tim preceding me, his solutions were always geared toward their lifestyles instead of mine. It was up to me, he'd always say, to learn to defend myself like they could. But I always resented the fact that they saw the constant tormenting as something I had to try and fix on my own.

Last time I checked, it was the bullies that were supposed to change their behavior, not the victims.

That was probably one of the biggest reasons, among a few others, that I refused to follow in their footsteps. They all seemed to be permanently stuck on their own little high horses, with their own ideas on how the world should work. It frustrated me to no end that they seemed utterly incapable of seeing things from the perspective of someone like me. It was as if we lived on completely different worlds, unable to see things the same way the other side did. True, my Dad had somewhat broken that barrier years ago, but after the way my childhood had gone so far, any hint of interest in his way of life had disappeared completely... and I didn't see myself changing my mind on the subject any time soon.

Alfred had been the one bright spot when matters like this came up in the past, but that support had gone away after he'd passed away four years ago. God, I missed him.

I gave my mother a glare that she easily brushed aside. My Dad's glares put mine to shame but they didn't faze her either. "I'll give you three guesses." My tone was dripping with sarcasm.

"Oh, Tom, they were only just playing, you know they don't mean any harm."

I gritted my teeth for probably the trillionth time in my life. "I'm not their fucking plaything! And don't give me that shit about them not meaning any harm!"

"Would you please stop swearing? You know your father and I don't like it. Now, why don't you just head up to your room for a few minutes while I have a talk with the girls? Get this all sorted out."

"Like last time, you mean? And the time before that? And the time before THAT? You just don't get it, do you? Not even the Great Detective gets it. And it's not just the family either. It's this whole goddamn world you've sucked me into! Have you ever thought that I might not want to take up the 'family business'? Have you ever thought about what I want at ALL?"

By the crestfallen look on her face, I could tell that she really hadn't. It was difficult to place all the blame on her though. Dick and Tim probably would have been first in line, but they'd already found gigs of their own, so everyone naturally expected me to become the Heir Apparent. I had grown sick of the whole idea by the time I was ten, but no one seemed to pay any attention when I voiced my opinion on the matter.

I was sick of their world. And today had been the last straw...

* * *

There I was in my room, minding my own business, working on a Chemistry report that was due the next day. Out of nowhere, my windows flew open, blowing my work all over the place as I was picked up by my ankles and lifted upside-down in the air. Two of them held me up while the third mercilessly tickled my stomach till I started getting dizzy.

Blood was rushing to my head and I was finding it difficult to breathe due to the laughing and coughing. My cries for help went unheard (or rather, ignored, since I knew my mother could hear what was going on), as I expected, so it wasn't until my nose started bleeding that they finally decided to put me down by casually tossing me across the room onto my bed. I wasn't delusional enough to think that they'd let me down out of concern. They always found it fascinating when I started to bleed, since they had yet to experience that 'mysterious' human condition themselves.

"What the fuck is wrong with you! Couldn't you see that I couldn't breathe?" I glared at them while they giggled at my plight. My sheets were now stained with blood as I reached for a box of tissues to stuff a couple wads up my nose.

"Oh, get over it little brother, you're fine, see? No harm no foul." That's my first sister, Athena. She was actually two years younger than me at fourteen, but already stood about three inches taller. It became a constant source of amusement for her to call me 'little brother' all the time.

"You shouldn't swear, Tommy, you know Mom doesn't like it." Sister number three, Genesis, or Genny for short. Ten years old. Still, thankfully, shorter than me, but the strongest one in the house, even stronger than Wonder-Mom. Technically, neither of my parents liked it when I swore, but Genny had a tendency to only worry about Mom's rules and consequences.

"Why do you even do that stuff anyway? You can just work for Dad when you grow up... If you ever grow up that is." And last but not least, the middle sister, Trinity, with a smirk permanently etched on her face and her chest constantly puffed out with pompous superiority. Over summer vacation, she passed me in height by an inch or so and she was the spitting image of a younger Wonder-Mom, where the other two were combination's of both her and Dad. Unfortunately for me, she had also begun taking on some of our Mom's more... womanly... features after turning twelve a few months ago, and had caught me staring once. She still hasn't let me live it down.

I think living with the nearly flawless beauty of four Amazon princesses was #37 on my list of reasons for hating my life, but I'll have to look it up later.

"Get out of my room!" I pointed to the door and tried to look as threatening as possible, but I could tell they were only barely holding their laughs in.

"We'll leave when we want to leave. It's not like you can do anything about it anyway."

"Yeah, if you want us gone, you're just going to have to throw us out yourself. Until then, I was planning on using your computer for a bit since mine's broken at the moment. You don't mind, do you?" Athena sat down at my desk without waiting for an answer.

Trinity walked up to me as Genny relaxed in my recliner in the corner. "Oh, come on, you don't mind if we crash here a bit, do you, Tommy-boy?" She batted her crystal-blue eyes at me and used her arms to push her chest together, probably in an attempt to distract me, but I was too mad at the moment to fall for it. I almost always had to resort to calling on Mom or Dad when they got like this, but I was determined to do it on my own this time.

"This is MY room and I need it empty and quiet to do my homework. You didn't ask permission before coming in!"

"So?"

Of course, they never saw themselves as ever being wrong, especially where I was concerned. "So, I don't go in YOUR rooms without asking first!"

"That's only because you know we'd beat you to a pulp if you did."

I growled in frustration and was about to yell my response, before quickly calming myself back down. Getting angry always seemed to egg them on, and my temper has always been one of my most frustrating weaknesses, especially within this particular household. Instead, I decided to make an attempt at reasoning with them. It probably wouldn't work, but it was worth a try. "Come on, guys, I just need to get my homework done. It's due tomorrow, so can you please just give me some privacy?" My blood immediately boiled when I realized that I was asking them permission to use MY own room.

"Why don't you just go use the library then?" Trinity, asked back at me, before quickly returning her gaze over Athena's shoulder at whatever she was doing on my computer.

It was then that something inside me snapped. Being blown off as if I didn't matter was always a sore spot for me. This time wasn't any different.

I couldn't stand it anymore. I walked right up next to my middle sister, hoping that her heightened senses wouldn't clue her in on what I was about to do. None of them ever expected me to get physical with them after the first few attempts failed miserably back when Athena was six and I was eight, but I wasn't thinking about consequences right now. I knew I was probably checking myself into at least an overnight hospital stay, but I just couldn't find a reason to care. Worst case? I could possibly die, but maybe death would be a welcome change? Then again, I might end up having to hang around some of Mom's crazy god and goddess buddies. Oh, wouldn't that be a hoot?

I quickly put my hands on her left shoulder and abdomen and shoved as hard as I could.

The fact that she tumbled sideways, knocking Athena off my desk chair, causing them both to fall to the floor in a heap, proved my theory to be correct. They hadn't expected a thing.

Unfortunately for me, in the next four seconds, my computer flew out the window, exploding into a ball of sparks and electronic components as it hit the tree outside my window. My left arm was dislocated as Athena twisted it behind my back to hold me in place, and I was kicked in the abdomen by Trinity, sending me flying through my bedroom door, across the hallway, and out the second story window opposite my room. Luckily, the impact I was expecting didn't come as I landed in the backyard pool, where I sputtered and struggled to keep my head above water.

As was common for me over the last couple years, I took the opportunity to contemplate what would happen if I just stopped trying. I knew my Mom would bawl her eyes out if I died, but would my sisters even shed a single tear for me? Would Dad break his emotionless persona like he did when Genny was born, or would I not be important enough to be cried over? Would my funeral be just one big pity party for the only Justice League offspring that was born without any powers? I provided the appropriate responses internally to keep myself from going clinically insane due to depression.

As my thoughts drifted away from suicide, knowing that I was probably too much of a chicken to go through with it anyway, I somehow pulled myself to the wall with only one working arm and a chest that burned every time I breathed. Once I was able to throw my arms up over the ledge for support, I looked up toward the window that I was thrown through to see my three sisters looking down at me.

Athena was still fuming, naturally. She hated looking weak, and the fall from my chair probably didn't help her desired super-image. Trinity had her arms folded as if my injuries were perfectly justified. Typical. I felt a pang of happiness as I saw that Genny looked remorseful, but then I squashed that idea down as soon as I remembered that all three of them were fast enough to catch me before I made it though the window. She could have prevented this if she really wanted to, but I'm guessing that she's probably just worried about what Mom and Dad will do when they find out what happened. Which, of course, made no sense at all, seeing that in all my years of existence, I hadn't once seen any of them receive more than a slap on the wrist for anything they got caught doing wrong. Note the part about being 'caught'...it might give you an idea as to how big a blind spot my parents have when it comes to the Golden Trio.

I still suspect that Dad knows a lot more than he lets on; given the surveillance equipment that I knew was posted throughout the manor, but that would just mean that he willingly ignored me in these types of situations, probably with the hope that I'll somehow miraculously 'toughen up' and be able to magically fend for myself like he does. I usually try to keep those types of ideas locked away, because, for some unfathomable reason, I always felt a deep-seeded need to cling to the belief that I was an equal among the rest of the family, but today, I just couldn't keep up the facade. It was a fact. I was inferior to almost everyone I knew. The only people that weren't clearly better than me were some of the kids in school, but that wasn't really saying much in the context of my home life.

"By Hera!"

I'm not quite sure why it took her so long to come out. I had every reason to believe that she'd heard everything that happened, but that just meant admitting to myself that she was trying to get me to do the 'standing-up-for-myself' thing too. Which, when it came to my sisters, was about as effective as punching a brick wall...for normal people anyway.

"Tommy, what happened?" As she ducked down to pick me up like a rag doll, I was too tired and injured to care about how pathetic it made me feel to be sixteen and still be lifted up into my mother's arms like a baby. As she was assessing my injuries I pointed up to the window at my sisters. Wonder-Mom looked up at them and gasped. Dare I hope that justice might be served, for once, by one of the founding members of the Justice League?

"Girls! Did you see who did this to Tommy?"

I closed my eyes and sagged in defeat.

* * *

A few hours later, brings us back to the present. I'm halfway out the front door with a duffel bag in each hand and a backpack all stuffed to capacity. My arm is beginning to sting with pain as my Mom let her emotions get in the way of her control. Luckily she wasn't holding the dislocated one.

"I'm going! And if you try and stop me, I will never forgive you!"

Tears were falling freely from her eyes by now, but I was beyond caring. "Can you at least wait until your Father comes home?"

I wasn't delusional enough to think that she was actually conceding to my eventual departure. She was hoping that Dad would do something to keep me home, whether by agreement or by force. It was at that moment that I realized that my plan was littered with flaws. Legally, it would be difficult for me to just go out and live on my own. Sure I had the money and the know-how, but in the eyes of the law, I was still just a sixteen-year-old boy, and my parents still had reign over me.

Then there was also the fact that if I left right now, odds were that the Batman would be paying me a visit in the middle of the night to bring me safely back to my loving family.

I stared into her eyes for a long minute before blinking and turning my head to the side. "You're hurting me."

The instant she realized how hard she'd been squeezing, her hand let go of me as if she were a normal person touching a hot stove. The bruise had already turned light blue and purple. "Oh, Tommy, I'm so sorry!" She crumpled to the floor, putting her face in her hands as she cried another apology. I hated it when she got like this. It showed that she actually cared for me, which I always knew to be true, but it always hurt to realize that it usually took physical injury on my part to bring it out into the open.

"Fine." I ignored her apology as I threw the bags down and made my way over to one of the entrance hall's few cushioned chairs. If I was going to have to wait, I wanted to stay as close to the front door as possible. After putting a scowl on my face and folding my arms in defiance, I caught a glimpse of blond hair disappearing around a corner at the top of the grand staircase. No doubt my sisters were enjoying the whole scene.

My mother apologized once more before thanking me for waiting. An awkward moment passed between us as she brushed my shoulder with her hand and excused herself to get cleaned up. It wasn't often that she lost control of her strength enough to physically hurt me, but the few times she did, she always ended up avoiding any substantial contact with me for a few days after the incident.

Whether it was a conscious decision or not, the emotional pain caused by a mother not wanting to touch her son, always cut deeper than any physical wound ever could, but that was just one of the many reasons that my relationship with my mother had been a bit strained over the last ten years or so.

Yes, I knew she loved me, and yes I knew she genuinely cared for me and wanted the best for me (in her mind anyway). But after studying up on the Amazonian culture she was raised in, I eventually came to understand why it was so much easier for her to be a mother to my sisters than it was to be a mother to me. She had no experience in the matter at all. She was raised to think that men were below the scum on the bottom of their boots.

For a long time, I was forgiving of her Amazonian nature. But then, as I grew up, I slowly began to recognize that my Mom was a very intelligent person. And that there were plenty of ways for her to educate herself on the typical interactions one might see between a mother and a son. Not to mention the fact that there were at least four normal women that had married into the League that would have gladly offered their insight on how a normal mother-son relationship usually worked in 'Man's World'.

Unfortunately, my mother's stubbornness and pride seemed to steer her away from seeking assistance from outside sources. The look on her face when she tried to outline a daily training and sparring schedule for me was one that still haunts me to this day. I don't think I've ever seen anyone look as confused and disappointed as she was when I got mad and stormed out of the room. It took a long talk with Dad for her to realize that she was practically asking me to drop out of school.

She still slipped up every now and then, like when she'd ask me to carry something that I had no hopes of lifting, but I think that that day was one of the few times where she truly realized that I wasn't like the rest of my family.

I was normal.

I didn't have a single meta-gene in me.

True, there were plenty of exceptions to the unspoken rule that League members had to have meta powers, but of those that didn't have some sort of super-human ability, there wasn't a single one among them that hadn't been 'created' behind unique, and more often then not, traumatizing circumstances.

My parents weren't murdered when I was young. I wasn't caught in a beam of radioactive light; I hadn't been trained from birth in the fighting style of some mysterious group of assassin's. I wasn't interested in technology at all, and magical powers always held a steep price that I was never interested in paying. I was just a kid trying to live as normal a life as I could; despite the fact that I was constantly surrounded by some of the most abnormal people you'd ever meet.

To make matters worse, it seemed my body structure took more after my mother's side of the family than my Dad's. It would have been nice to be able to pack on at least a few pounds of muscle like him, but no matter how hard I worked at it, I just couldn't gain any mass. I gave up on it a year ago after Athena forced us into a bicep measuring contest. She beat me by a couple inches, despite the fact that they hadn't had to exercise a day in their life beyond weapons training and sparring.

After sitting in the entrance hall for nearly an hour, my head, for some reason, began to hurt real badly. I've had headaches before, not to mention the occasional concussion, but I'd never felt a pain this intense on any part of my body before. Not even when Genny decided to test out a crotch kick that she'd learned from one of our 'cousins'.

"Tom?"

I lifted my head to look up at him. He must have noticed the anguish in my eyes as he rushed forward to kneel in front of me. "Tom, what's wrong?"

"I...I'm not sure, I have a real bad headache, it's never been this bad before."

"Before? You've had headaches like this before?"

With how many times I've sustained head injury in my short life, I once again doubted his reputation as a detective. But in this one instance, his question held substance. I really hadn't had one like this before. Not this bad anyway.

"Not like this, never this bad. It feels like someone is sticking hot needles into my skull."

He laid me down on the adjacent sofa as the pain shot up in intensity. I gave an involuntary yelp as my vision became unfocused. I could feel the arrival of my Mom and sisters a few seconds later. She knelt beside Dad as he gave her a sit-rep. My sisters stood off to the side.

Another shot of pain and I felt tears well up in my eyes. I could feel liquid dripping from my nose and ears. I was contemplating the embarrassment of having snot run down my face when my mother's next words put that thought to an abrupt halt.

"By Hera! Bruce, he's crying blood!"

I opened my eyes to see that my vision was now clouded with red liquid. My father systematically examined my eyes as my mother once again put the bones in my hand through a stress test. I glanced over to the side at my sisters. They held impassive expressions until they saw the blood dripping from my eyes, nose and ears. Genny put her hands over her mouth in shock. Trinity looked down in shame, obviously trying to hold back any genuine emotion. She probably felt responsible for what was happening, seeing as she was the one that kicked me into the pool, but somehow I doubted that she was to blame for my current condition. Athena looked as if she wanted to slap the headache away by force, just so she wouldn't have to look at the anguish in my eyes, which ironically, if she did it hard enough, would probably work. Though I might lose my head in the process.

Right now I was almost to the point of asking for just that. But thinking about it became increasingly difficult as the pain kept intensifying.

Was this finally the end of Thomas Jules Wayne? Struck down in his teenage prime by a freak brain aneurysm before he even had the chance to get to second base with a girl?

I was contemplating the psychological reasons for my dying thoughts to be based around sex, when a bright flash of light interrupted my musings.

"Who are you?" My father whirled around, most likely putting himself into a battle-stance. The growl in his voice meant that an intruder had made their way inside somehow.

"I've come to help your son Mr. Wayne. His suffering is needless, and if we don't act fast, he will be lost."

"Athena?" My mother questioned.

"You are correct Diana of Themyscira. It is good to see you again."

"How can you help our son?" Dad interrupted before Mom could go all worship-y.

"It is difficult to explain. The best way I can describe it is that his intelligence is growing too fast for his body to handle. He must accompany me to Olympus for a short period of time to be put under the care of Coeus while he recovers."

"Coeus? The Titan?"

I couldn't hear anything for an answer, so I assume the Goddess nodded. "He is the Titan of Intelligence, and the only one that will be able to train your son to get a handle on his gift."

"He's getting powers?" I could imagine my mother's eyes widen with hope, though at the moment, I couldn't fathom anyone calling this level of pain a 'gift'. I was also a bit hurt by the amount of hope that I heard in her voice. But if it took me getting powers for my family to finally accept me and treat me as an equal, then I didn't want them.

"Yes, but not in the same manner as your League's meta-humans and extraterrestrials. His abilities are purely the result of a particular combination of genetics. A once-in-a-million combination, so to speak, that we have been expecting for quite some time."

My consciousness faded in and out as the conversation progressed. Before I knew it, I was enveloped in what I could only describe as a cocoon of soft clouds. The pain ebbed as I opened my eyes for the first time in what seemed like hours. I saw my family standing on the other side of the room, huddled together, watching me with worry. I looked up to my right at the Goddess of Wisdom. She gave me a warm smile as we disappeared into nothingness. The last thing I saw before blacking out was my sister Genny crying into my mother's shoulder. I didn't think I would ever miss them as much as I did in that moment.

* * *

I was standing at the gates of Wayne Manor, holding my finger up to the buzzer that announced visitors. Before I pressed it, however, my mind ran over the past few months I'd spent with the Gods on Mount Olympus. You'd think that hanging out with a horde of Gods would be all about picnics, frolicking and orgies, but then you'd be horribly wrong.

The Gods were extremely offended at being forced to in the presence of a lowly human, and they weren't at all bashful in letting me know of that fact. I could never get a straight answer as to why humans were strictly forbidden on Mount Olympus, but fortunately - or unfortunately if you chose to see it that way - due to my unique problem, I seemed to be the one and only exception to the rule. That didn't stop them from being obstinate pricks at every opportunity, though.

Coeus was no picnic either. At first I thought that I'd end up being the smartest man in existence or something, which would allow me to cut my own path in life, regardless of what my family and friends expected. I could have done whatever I wanted, and I was almost giddy at the possibilities after getting more information on the matter.

But, as is par for the course for my life up to this point, my hopes were dashed almost as quickly as they were raised.

Apparently I was becoming too smart to live. The combination of my Dad's sanity-questioning genius together with my Mom's superior Amazon mental utilization, gave me the unique ability to fire 100% of my brain's neurons at any given time, rather than the typical 10%. It was quite surprising, therefore, to learn that my intelligence was rising to levels that could possibly cause a break the space-time continuum or some other Star-Trek-sounding gibberish. I never really paid attention to that part of the lecture when Coeus talked about it, but I did catch a few snippets here and there. At least enough to know that there was a chance that I could destroy the known universe if we let my brain progress without hindrance. As if my Chemistry homework wasn't already enough for me to worry about.

It was also a little surprising to find out that there had been four others like me in existence, since the dawn of time, but that I was the first human. They didn't tell me the fate of the other four, but by the expressions on their faces, it wasn't something I would want to experience. Here's hoping I don't die a horrible death or turn into some whacked-out universe destroyer.

Eventually, Coeus told me that he was going to be training me to sacrifice my intelligence, and in return, I would be granted a super human ability of my choosing. Which, after my mother's reaction back in the entrance hall, wasn't something I was quite ready to agree with. I didn't want to show up at home with a power and have everyone all of a sudden accept me with open arms and warm smiles. It would tear me apart to live with the knowledge that I would be measured by what I could do, and not by who I was.

I also didn't understand how losing infinite intelligence could be equal to gaining a powerful ability, but in the end, I didn't really care. There was no way they would let me refuse the exchange, and I had no desire to destroy all known existence, so eventually I came up with an ability that I thought I might marginally enjoy, without having to sacrifice my basic non-meta-human principles. How the family would take it was a whole different matter entirely. Dad wouldn't mind, of course, but the girls might be a little peeved. Not that I cared that much, especially after all the trouble they've given me in the past.

"Tom?" My Dad's voice called over the comm as I stood there with my hand over the button.

I smiled into the camera. "Hi Dad."

The gate began to swing open, and with how excited he sounded, I was pretty sure he was already rushing up the stairs from the cave to meet me.

I expected my mother to burst through the doors and swoop down on me, but oddly, she never came. By the time I reached the porch, the door swung open and I was enveloped in my Dad's arms.

"Tom! Thank God! I've missed you so much!"

I smiled into his shoulder. It was kind of nice to be greeted with something akin to normalcy. I truly did want to see my Mom and sisters, but it was a little therapeutic to not come home to a house of flying demi-goddesses. "Where are Mom and the girls?" I asked as I pulled back from the hug.

"They're in Africa on a mission at the moment. They started going with the League about a month ago." I could see the apprehension in his eyes, he was unsure of how I'd take the news, as if I'd be jealous or something. I wasn't fazed a bit, and I let him know that fact with a wide smile.

"Oh? When will they be back?"

The puzzled look on his face was priceless. "Last I heard the mission was going as planned, so probably later tonight. Are you sure you're okay?"

I smiled again. "Never better." I stood back and grabbed the few belongings I'd acquired during my stay on Olympus before heading through the door. My Dad followed closely behind.

"Do you wanna tell me what happened up there?"

I threw my stuff on the floor and turned to him with another wide grin. "Sure, let's get something to eat first, though. I'm starved."

* * *

"You're kidding me?"

"Nope."

My Dad sat there, flabbergasted at what I'd told him, and unable to form words for what was probably the first time in his life.

"So do you think it was a good choice?" I asked, honestly curious.

"It could be dangerous if you don't use it correctly or at the right times, but overall, I think it was a good choice. The perfect choice for you especially. I'm very proud of you, son."

"Thanks, I thought so too."

"I was almost afraid you'd come back as some crazy super-nerd. Using your mind to manipulate the universe how you saw fit."

"So was I, to be honest, but it turns out humans just can't handle that level of intelligence. No one can, really, though Coeus was mum on whether a God could or not."

We talked the whole afternoon away about everything that I went through and about everything that had happened while I was gone.

It seemed only minutes had passed when we both heard the telltale swoosh of the female members of our family landing out on the back patio. I looked at my Dad and smirked. He winked back. We came up with somewhat of a prank that would reveal to them what my powers were, and hopefully, instill in them the fact that I now had the means to make them see me as their equal, in a way that wouldn't sacrifice my ideals. It was kind of risky to do it this way, but with my new ability, I knew it couldn't get too far out of hand, and I was _really_ in the mood to take them down a peg.

* * *

The girls walked into the kitchen as I sat there eating a bowl of cereal. My Dad was sitting stiffly in his chair as if he was some sort of robot. I lifted my eyes so that I could properly greet them.

"Wonder Woman, Athena, Trinity, Genesis, how wonderful it is to see you!"

All four of them stopped in their tracks and stared up at me in shock. I could tell my Mom wanted to rush at me and hug me to within an inch of my life, but the expression on my Dad's face held them all still.

"Say Hello to them Batman."

In the perfect impression of someone who was being mind-controlled, my Dad complied, "Hello Wonder Woman, hello Athena, hello Trinity, hello Genesis." By the ease in which they were falling for it, they probably had the same idea as him about me coming back as some insane super-nerd.

Athena was the first to respond. "What did you do to him? Let him go!"

"Nothing. He's the same father we've always known, I've just taken a bit of his intelligence and replaced it with power. He's a bit dumber, but he'll be a lot safer on patrols now."

All four girls immediately looked angry as they began to advance. I pretended to command Dad to intercept them, while in reality I was activating my real power. Dad said he would especially enjoy this part since it was not something he was usually able to do as a normal human against an Amazon warrior.

Dad masterfully intercepted all four of them, preventing them from reaching me, fighting them, hand-to-hand and foot-to-foot. All four of the girls were surprised at his ability to stop them. They were probably assuming that my 'intelligence exchange' had given him enough power so that he ended up just as strong as they were. They weren't too far off in guessing the effect, but the illusion we set threw off any hint of discovering what was truly going on.

I could tell that all four of them were beginning to reach a small level of panic at not being able to get to me to save Dad, but their training seemed to be keeping them from losing any composure. It almost got to the point where the prank wasn't fun anymore...almost.

Fortunately for them, the ruse couldn't be taken any further as my father couldn't hold his act any longer. He broke down laughing while raising his hands in victory. "Yes! That was totally worth it! Thank you for that, son."

All four girls let go of their battle stances, rubbing their arms from the dull aches they received from trying to get past Dad. Their confusion made me break down into stifled giggles.

"What is going on here?" Mom finally spoke after catching her breath. Something she probably hadn't ever had to do before.

Dad answered for me as I was struggling to hold in my laughter. "Your son was just demonstrating his new ability."

"Ability?" Trinity asked. "I thought he was just going to be super smart?"

I eventually calmed down enough to respond. "No living being could handle the level of intelligence I was achieving, so in exchange for giving that up, I was able to choose a super ability for myself. I just used it on you four. Dad was just acting."

"What exactly was it?" Mom asked, still a bit afraid of what I did in order to put them on even footing with Dad. I know she'd lost her powers a few times in the past and I knew it was a bit of a sore subject.

Dad wrapped a proud arm around my shoulders as he beamed with excitement. "Your son now has the ability to negate any power in existence. Meta, electrical, magical, solar, negative, physical, nuclear, any power you can think of, he can render it useless. He turned the four of you into normal humans so that I could spar with you without getting beaten to a pulp."

All four of them dropped their jaws in amazement. Then abject fear played across their faces as Trinity and Athena suddenly flew up in the air and hit their heads on the ceiling. When they came crashing back down to the floor, rubbing their heads, I laughed again. "It's not a permanent removal, I can control the ability any way I want. I can shoot it across a room or I can shoot it across the universe, I can leave it active, or I can disable it altogether. I can even control the magnitude."

"So basically, you want to make everyone as puny as you?" Trinity growled as she picked herself up off the floor.

I frowned in response. "No, I chose this power so that I could get my family and friends to see me as more than just a pathetic waste of space! I also chose it so that I could defend myself against them, as sad as that sounds!"

"You know we don't see you like that, honey," my Mom quickly responded.

"It may not be on a conscious level, but I've seen the looks of pity and superiority in each of your eyes throughout my whole life, even in Dad's." My Dad seemed genuinely hurt by this. He probably hadn't realized that he had always treated me the same as his first two adopted sons. Though it was nowhere near as bad as the females in the family had done. "I chose this ability so that I could provide the world of meta-humans with a bit of perspective. Yes it feels great that you three will no longer be able to push me around like you always have, but ultimately, I think that most heroes, and villains alike, could eventually use a dose of mortal reality. I'm not going to go around getting rid of everyone's powers just to spite them, but if I think it's needed, I will provide them with a lesson in humility."

"Who died and made you judge of righteousness?" Athena complained. "What right do you have to take away who we are?"

"I don't have any right to that at all, as long as you don't seek to directly harm me. Which is exactly how it will be from now on. No one pushes me around just because I'm not as strong as they are anymore. If they try it, I'll turn them into the equivalent of an eighty-year-old paraplegic before than can say 'wheelchair'. And taking away your powers isn't taking away who you are. You aren't defined by your abilities; you're defined by what you do with them, and unfortunately, where I'm concerned, your abilities have only caused sadness, anger and frustration!"

"I'd be only too happy to take you all down a peg and show you the seeds that you've sown. But I'd rather that you three just grow the fuck up! It's not my job to be your parent or teacher. You leave me alone and I'll leave you alone, that's how it'll probably have to be for a while. But eventually I'm hoping that some day, we can have the kind of brother-sister relationship that I see all my friends at school having, instead of you treating me like your goddamn pet!"

The tension in the room after my tirade put the room in silence. But it was soon cut off as Genny ran across the room and enveloped me in a desperate hug. "I was so scared when you left. I thought I'd never see you again."

My heart almost literally burst with happiness right then. I'd never seen any of my sisters show this kind of emotion toward me before. I surmised that Genny had probably always felt this way, but because she looked up to her older sisters so much, she was too afraid to show any of it. I wrapped my arms around her and told her that I would never leave her if I could ever help it. I could tell that her and I would be the first ones to mend our burned bridges, and nothing in the world could have made me happier than I was at that very moment.

Soon after that, my Mom and Dad put their arms around us, and I was surprised to eventually feel Athena and Trinity gingerly join in soon after. I'm pretty sure that this is the first time we've ever had a family hug, and I was, for the first time in my life, thankful to the Gods, that I now had the ability to allow my Mom to finally hug me as tight as I knew she had always wanted to.

THE END


End file.
